Dane Reynolds And The Heat That Saved Professional Surfing

What a day! What a d-d-d-day it is going to be! Round 4 action! Today Taj will surf and Mick and Joel and Dane and Kelly and Jordy! The sun is out and I am hung over! But I don’t need sobriety or a clear head when there is this sort of hot surf on tap! This sort of totally radical surf!

And it is time for quarter final three. Dane Reynolds in white versus Joel Parkinson in red. Even though some clouds drifted in when Mick lost, it is so totally sunny again. The tide is all the way out and the surf is firing. Big blue and green and white dusted with sand barrels. Gorgeous women and a handful of handsome men wander to water’s edge. Snapper Rock is a nice place to watch people surf. Brazilians flash their backsides.

I had talked to Channel Island’s Travis Lee about Dane’s boards earlier in the blah blah part of the day. He told me that Dane had been riding a 6’1 18 ½ 2 ¼ Proton nicknamed the Taxidriver a lot. It had cracked on the rail where Dane puts his back foot and they had kept getting it repaired because Dane loves. “Protons have a lot of bend and work really good in a lower tide” Travis had said. The tide is so low right now!

Dane wastes no time in catching his first wave. It is a perfect wall and he tears it to shreds. He is so loose on land and so angry in the water! Like a drunk man beating a bad wife. He violates every ounce of salty water he can. He smashes the lip and sets his fins free. He bottom turns and smashes again. So much smashing! He gets a 9.27 and the full decks of people can’t help but hoot and cheer. Joel is hometown hero, but my goodness. Did you see that?

A trick helicopter comes flying in low and hovers over the contestants. It flies forwards and backwards. The driver is totally showing off and a strange Russian girl standing near me says, “Outta sight!”

Dane catches the second wave too and treats it just as naughtily. Massive floaters and lip hacks with such force that he almost spins entirely around. He rides it all the way to the inside section and again the decks of people can’t help but sigh and blush. 8.10

Parko catches a very gorgeous wave as Dane is still spinning on the inside. He gets sooooo creepy with long layback snaps and knee buckling floaters and another smooth arc sending water all the way up to the helicopter (almost) 8.5.

But then Dane catches this wave. He drops in and goes straight to a really powerful carve in the pocket straight into a bottom turn straight into a fins out tail sliding hack only to come down and stall and get into a barrel where he stays for so so so so such a long time before sneaking out and keeps surfing surfing surfing down the line. Off toward Surfers Paradise. He maybe does an air at the end. 9.93

The full decks of people cheer loudly but are also a little stunned. Everyone on the beach stares at the giant replay video screen for the next five minutes.

Joel Parkinson is comboed at his own beach in the prime of his competitive career. The heat ends with Joel holding an 8.5 and an 8.97 and comboed.

Maybe I am being hyperbolic, but nothing in competitive surfing really mattered before this heat (except everything Kelly ever did).

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I fully agree with you on this, but you need to take your head out of danes ass for one second and realize that by you writing this, you come off as a complete homo sexual.. Not trying to be mean man but really you sound like you want to have a relationship with him. Thats the thing with people that work at surf mags, all they do is kiss ass. Why cant you guys write something that doesnt make you look like your 5 feet deep in a pro surfers ass?

8=D

these posts are starting to grow on me.

taylor

for all the homophobia, John, you spend a lot of time typing about ass. keep it up Chas, you sexy homo.

ac

epic post

hugh

completely horrendously overscored on his first frantic arm flailing ride – 9.2 for that!?!. I don’t get all the hype – one heat….changed surfing forever – huh? lets see how he goes in the next heat. kaino, agree with you on the homophobia.

put down the bong

this ranks as the most vile piece of journalistic garbage i’ve ever read. stop trying so hard to be cool. you’re writing is akin to the kid who wore abercrombie his entire adolescence until he was around 18, then went to urban outfitters and bought his first v-neck and fake wayfarers. dane deserves more than this haggard excuse for prose.

put down the bong

your* ^

Slinky

Yep Dane ripped in that quarter, full rail, 110% balls to the wall surfing fantastic. But its a amazing no body realized how lucky he was that the judges pushed him through his round 4 heat against Dan Ross. Danes competitor was throwing huge hacks and only receiving 5’s, whilst Dane bogged and tried really hard (not cool for a rock star) all the way down the line. It was a pretty average display and nobody witnessed this? Sure he did one good turn a grab rail fin waft but really the judges and media have to see surfing for what it is.
Or am i missing something here? I guess I’m a surfer not a groupie and surfing is surfing no matter who is doing it.

Definite changing of the gaurd down on the Goldie, finally surfing is churning over again, out with the old gaurd in with the new. Seen it all my life since Shaun and MR it’s gonna change.

???????????

Wow, someone above must have woke up on the wrong side of the bed. But it sounds like you need to have a talk with Wanda Sykes. What if some one said, “you need to take your head out of danes ass for one second and realize that by you writing this, you come off as a complete DIP SHIT COMMENTING ON A WEBSITE AT 7:23 in the morning. Get a job, or better yet go surf… fag.

Dude

Like I said Dane is God.

Strunk and White

how about a drunken man beating this terrible writer? nice way to condone violence against women–really gives some insight into why i follow professional surfing. blah blah blah a whole year of this to look forward to blah blah blah

Jay

parko looked like he was about to cry

bru

dane got robbed last year against taj, with a barrel the judges never saw. Surfers getting overscored always works it self out, sooner or later.

ButSeriouslyNow …

man oh man, all the amazing editorial and journalistic achievements under editors like gilovich, brisick and evan slater – most especially under ev’s stewardship – and the Surfing brand / reputation plummets to new lows with chas smiths writing during the course of a single contest. so sad.

Zinsser

I feel so proud knowing there is one other person in the world who reads surfing magazine who has also read Strunk and White. And whoever you are, you are so correct. This writing IS terrible.

andrew

bad writing maybe but danes surfing was at a whole other level in that heat. Rd.4- those 5’s dan ross was scoring were on point cause the potential to surf those waves waayy more critically existed in every turn he did-if dane had caught the waves dan did and performed at a b level it would of been 8 point rides..the real rip of was how jordy beat bede in that rd.??!! and jordys over score in slaters heat made it so kelly couldn’t hunt down a high 6-7 wave, instead he had to wait for a perfect wave which didn’t exist in his heat…dane smashed it and showed what 9 pt rides should look like!

White toast & bacon

“Like a drunk man beating a bad wife?” Nice, Chas. Real classy metaphor there. I’m sure I’m not the only reader to witness his own mother’s abuse and torment as a battered wife. You prick. Travis, please send Matt Walker or Nick Carroll or Nathan Myers or any of your other time-proven writers to cover this event next year. It’s the World Tour season opener for God’s sake. Please respect that. There were a hundred mini-sagas on the Goldy waiting to be explored, but all we got was how Chas Smith feels about himself and his place in the pro surfing spectrum. But what a blown opportunity for the Surfing brand. Chas Smith is the opposite of professional.

DIELON

I watched a few heats in that contest….. a couple of those blah blah heats with someone standing over my shoulder that i didn’t know telling me how hard kelly rips as jordy smith did turns that actually made me want to go surfing and be creative….then i watched dane take off on worse waves than dan ross and bog a couple of turns and put a few turns on rail that were probably the only reason why 90% of people logged on to watch the contest. Jermey Flores complained saying he should of won……it goes to show……people want to see more good surfing than good contest surfing. And if you were to break down danes waves compaired to half the contestants, one committed dane turn is equal to four jermey flores turns….sorry bud…he just surfs that much better than you, theres nothing you can complain about.

a groms perspective

to the haters: jesus, stop whining. quit pretending like your opinions matter and go for a surf. its like you feel accomplished when you post hurtful comments or complaints online (oh wait..)

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